Black Weirdo Rich Kids: Zoë, Willow, Jaden and Pop Nepotism

"I could stare out your window and fuck you tonight," Zoë Kravitz, the lead singer of Lolawolf, sings in "Drive". Affecting a low, soothing pitch, Kravitz under-sings or simply drives in her own lane, at her own pace. The song never seems to move in the direction you think it’s moving in; there’s no build-up, no climax. There’s not much beyond a modest, sustained vibrato and a simple chord progression. It’s repetitive, lulling the listener to sleep.

Zoë's place in the Black Weirdo/carefree black girl ecosystem is marked by a lack of urgency. Zoë's affected chillness in "Drive" seems try-hard, but she’s not in a hurry to pop off because she doesn’t have to be in a hurry. Nepotism—and the power that comes with it—makes things low-stakes. She has nothing to lose and everything to gain, so she can under-sing and under-perform all she wants.

Singing unencumbered by tricks and garnishes is the opposite of over-singing and the difference between singing and sanging. While many singers finger-conducted high notes and poorly enunciated their way into our hearts in 2014, Zoë Kravitz did not, which is what places her firmly in the weird, carefree black girl category but also what distinguishes her from it. Weird, carefree black girls, after all, aren’t without their tricks and garnishes: Willow Smith adorns her lyrics with purple prose, her singing just as ambitious and flowery; SZA at times sings in an English accent; Jillian Hervey of Lion Babe’s appeal is a throwback to Erykah and Corinne Bailey Rae at the same damn time, which is quite a feat; and FKA twigs' weirdness and carefreeness seems careful and curated.

But comparing Zoë Kravitz to another carefree black girl is like comparing Ariana Grande to Jojo. It’s not enough. Jojo is one of Ariana’s many sanging, non-WASP predecessors but the more obvious, stronger comparison to Ariana, we know, is Mariah Carey. Zoë Kravitz’ strongest influence may not be the most obvious, though, because the weird, carefree black girl starter kit lives in a bad Twitter joke about drawn-on freckles, slicked down baby hairs and flower crowns.

In an interview with Noisey last year, Zoë Kravitz cited Cree Summer as her biggest influence:

My godmother, Cree Summer, who was on A Different World with my mom. She’s an amazing musician who put out a record in the early 2000s and she kind of got fucked over by a label, which is unfortunate because it’s a beautiful record. She is a strong woman who wrote intelligent, fun music, and I’ve always been really inspired by her.

Cree Summer’s Street Faerie wasn’t a commercial success but among black women it became a classic, weirder alternative to Erykah Badu’s Baduizm. Both albums were black and bohemian in the same spirit. Badu and Summer’s bohemian-ness and blackness were central parts of their weird construction. Street Faerie and Baduizm both defied the label "neo-soul," but Cree, in particular, wrote a folk rock album, so the "neo-soul" label was inappropriate—just like it’s inappropriate how "post-R&B" or "alternative R&B" are catch-all terms to lump disparate, 2010s RnB and RnB-adjacent acts.

While Erykah and Summer were similar in a good way, it seemed like only one of them could have the chance at being black, weird and successful. In a way, Zoë Kravitz’ recent success can be looked at as her carrying the torch, with her father being who he is, for someone in her family who couldn’t make it in the music industry. Nepotism, then, can be read as an act of resilience in a world where black people are rarely ever handed anything.

Historically, black people only gain the sort of access and power they want, or that’s truly equal, when they rise above the ranks; nepotism has never really been a career option. The Smith kids, like Zoë Kravitz, are products of top power and black status. Will and Jada Pinkett-Smith are stars, ergo Jaden and Willow are stars, even if they’re not that good yet. They have what so many black kids don’t have: a chance to be mediocre, to fail. This chance to fail is the interesting space between a blank canvas and a black canvas. Their acceptable blackness exalts them, giving them leverage despite making songs that are experimental. In what other world, but the world of a black weirdo rich kid, would the lyric "just the sound of the distant water in Erykah Badu" be anything but terrible?

Jaden, Willow and Zoë's transferred powers— what Smith and Kravitz' money, reputation and legacy can allow them to do— does not make them exempt or immune from racial projections. It does, however, give them more room to experiment, which is why critics seem playfully enamored with them. Thus, they can get away with not being great in a way that signals not a nepotism problem but a nepotism solution: black kids getting a chance to be black and weird.

The opportunity is something many black people view with fascination and enthusiasm instead of the same scorn with which one views white nepotism. This would explain why Childish Gambino seems obsessed with Jaden in a way that borders on creepy or Frank Ocean’s penned two songs that allude to the Willows, Jadens and Zoës of the world.

Jaden and Willow and Zoë—in all their trappings—aren’t that weird. They are, after all, light-skinned, well-to-do, acceptably black and there’s nothing weird about that. Their acceptable blackness exalts them in a way where they can say and do anything and it’s not interpreted the same way it would be interpreted for non-rich black kids. If the Smith kids were dark-skinned perhaps more people would assume they had just finished smoking weed. Instead, their weirdness is interpreted for what it is.